The UK Department of Business and Trade (DBT) has announced a second series of UKCA roundtables, and has launched of a survey on conformity assessment costs. As we’ve discussed in previous EMIF meetings, a series of roundtable events already took place during April and May. The intention of those sessions, during which DBT had asked for frank and honest feedback on a number of UKCA implementation aspects, was that DBT would use what they heard from stakeholders and use the information gained to help develop the upcoming Product Safety Review. However, the DBT UKCA policy team would like to learn more from stakeholders, hence a second series of roundtables has been scheduled. In parallel to announcing these roundtable events, DBT has also launched a study in order that they can establish an understanding of the cost of the conformity assessment process.
The UKCA roundtables will take place from 2nd to 17th August. These events will be held in London, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Southampton, Darlington, Manchester and Birmingham. If you would like to attend any of them then please register here. Once you have registered, DBT will send a formal invitation to confirm attendance, with details of the venue, an agenda and questions to reflect on prior to the roundtable. If DBT is unable to accommodate all interested attendees, they will look to arrange further opportunities for input, including through virtual events.
The Department for Business and Trade says:
We are committed to engaging with industry to provide businesses with support, and to understand how take a pragmatic approach to improving the UK’s regulatory regime to the benefit of businesses and consumers. Having met with industry stakeholders in roundtables across the UK and in Europe earlier this year, we are keen to continue our engagement with industry stakeholders to gain input on the UKCA regime. DBT has also opened a business survey to understand the costs of conformity assessment. The questions in this survey are separate to the roundtables. At the end of the survey there is an opportunity to provide feedback on UKCA as a whole and its implementation. Completion of this survey should take approximately 10 to 20 minutes. The survey can be found here and will be open until 3rd August 2023.